


Practical Applications of Winchester Logic

by kototyph



Series: Gravitation 'Verse [1]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, Columbus Day, M/M, Sastiel Week, Stanford Era, Surreptitious Pancakes, Winchester Logic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-09
Updated: 2012-10-09
Packaged: 2017-11-15 22:44:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 938
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/532599
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kototyph/pseuds/kototyph
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A huge half-cooked glob of batter hits the wall, and slides sadly and slimily down the plaster. Castiel watches it go, forehead wrinkled in confusion. “It wasn’t supposed to do that.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Practical Applications of Winchester Logic

There's a thump, and a quiet "Ah," followed by surreptitious crinkling and rustling and the squadgy noise Sam associates with Styrofoam being crushed.

Footsteps move over the floor, past Sam where he sprawls facedown across his bed, arms and one leg dangling off the sides of the mattress in the spread-eagle position he'd assumed after finishing his term paper at four am. Judging by the shooting pain in his joints, he hasn't moved since.

The furtive noises continue, a series of subtle squeaks and clanks coming from the direction of his laughably tiny excuse for a kitchenette, culminating in an impressive bang. Sam is forced to conclude that some reaction on his part is needed, and manages a credible, "Hrr?" By which he means, who the fuck is in his apartment at ass o'clock on a bank holiday?

"Shhh," someone tells him. "Go back to sleep."

"Nrgh," Sam responds. By which he means that it's a damn shame he's the victim of home invasion and possibly being robbed but it's certainly nothing to get excited or, you know, _awake_ over.

Several more minutes of full of secretive clinks and the jingle of metal pass, followed by a _gloop_ and an odd sizzling sound, and the distinctive multilayered smell of Sam's thirty-year-old two-burner stove firing up. Despite his desperate desires to the contrary, Sam finds his eyes sliding open, lids scraping over his corneas like sandpaper, and very, very reluctantly he turns his head to see who is trying to burn his crappy studio down.

The sight that greets him is certainly novel: Castiel, bent over a skillet Sam is not sure he's ever seen before, hesitantly prodding something in at the bottom of the pan with a fancy flat spatula.

"C's?" he tries. "Th' fuck?"

"Hello, Sam," the man says in his mellow monotone. "Happy Columbus Day."

It's so surreal that Sam takes a moment to appreciate the sheer ridiculousness of the moment: the dawn light (if he's gotten three hours of sleep he'll eat this pillow), the greasy aroma of burnt dinners past, the friend Sam suspects is some kind of hobo savant in his apartment _at his stove_ , attempting to cook... something...

"What," Sam annunciates, "th' actual. Fuck."

"I wanted to go to the sea today," Castiel says, apropos of nothing. "But the trains weren't running."

" _What?"_

"I wanted to go to the sea," Castiel repeats patiently. "But it's a holy day. The trains weren't running, so I decided to take a walk."

"'N you came here," Sam says blankly.

"No. I went to a diner."

It's just too fucking early for this. "Cas. _Why._ "

"I wanted to eat," Castiel says peevishly. "If it's a holy day, there should be food."

This... this skirts _Dean-levels_ of logic, and Sam squeezes his eyes shut against the horror. "And you... didn't eat at the diner."

"I don't have any money left," Castiel confides, poking at whatever's in the skillet. "In the back, they were flipping pancakes." He sounds wistful. "They looked delicious."

"Pancakes."

"I decided to make them myself. It's quite simple," he boasts, gesturing at the filthy collection of bowls, whisks, measuring cups and ingredients piled up on Sam's tiny silver of counter space. "Just the combination of exact amounts of proscribed material, and the application of heat."

" _Pancakes._ "

"I'm making enough for the both of us," Castiel says, and gives his spatula a confident flick.

A huge half-cooked glob of batter hits the wall, and slides sadly and slimily down the plaster. Castiel watches it go, forehead wrinkled in confusion.

"It wasn't supposed to do that."

"For the love of _God_ ," Sam moans, and staggers out of bed.

He's been meaning to talk to Castiel about this habit he has of picking up random things and ideas and leaving the results strewn all over Sam's place— old books and art supplies and interesting bits of wood and insect wings and once, very briefly, an entire coyote skeleton. It's an _attic studio_ , there's barely enough room for a bed and a desk, let alone the totally intact, door-sized stained-glass window Castiel had shown up with last week.

"Don't you have a home?" Sam had asked, completely exasperated, and Castiel had gotten this look in his eye that made Sam shut up and prop the window against the wall and loudly exclaim how nice it looked there, how pretty the colors were.

Yeah, he's been meaning to bring it up. But—

"Dad used to say they were done on the bottom when the top had chicken pox," Sam says, pointing to the bubbles in the wet batter. "That's how you know it's time to flip them. You've got to do it slowly," and he demonstrates.

"I found chocolate chips," Castiel announces, crowding close to Sam's side to gaze into the pan. "When should they go on?"

Sam wipes a stray splatter off on his boxers and scratches at his bare stomach, yawning hugely. "Dump 'em in the bowl."

"Which one?"

Sam frowns down at him. "Whadya mean, which—?"

There are four bowls, of variable lumpiness and hue. The chocolate chips are dumped in one, strawberries in another, and before Sam can stop him Castiel's crumbled graham crackers in the third ("If you've never tried it, how do you know it's bad?" Fucking _Dean Winchester logic_ , God help him if they ever meet). The fourth they leave plain, and start swapping out varieties on each pass.

With the pancakes sizzling merrily away and Castiel a happy, hovering presence at his elbow, Sam clears his throat.

"Y'know, I was thinking about moving someplace a little bigger. Maybe with two bedrooms...?"


End file.
